Maybe I am being overly cynical but this sounds like a handout to fossil fuel companies to keep people using gas longer. The standing charge was an extra reason to push me towards cutting off my gas supply entirely several years ago and going fully electric.
Crazy thing is despite all the propaganda against it, my heat pump works great in my house that is almost 100 years old. A kW of heat is a kW of heat regardless of where it comes from.
I’m not buying it.
Adding it to the unit rate will not help poorer households.
Poorer households tend to have prepayment meters.
The unit rate of prepayment meters is already higher than the unit rate of paying monthly/quarterly etc
How is increasing that unit rate going to help
Do you know of any numbers on the proportion of those with prepared meters? Anecdotally, I’ve only ever seen it in one flat I started in.